Dak Prescott reminds Charles Haley of just another Joe. As in Joe Montana, Haley’s teammate with the 49ers.
“Dak reminds me of Joe,” Haley told Newy Scruggs of DFW’s NBC 5.
Haley heaps praise on the young quarterback. But the Hall of Fame linebacker/defensive end, who maintains a presence at the Cowboys’ training complex, admits he became annoyed with Prescott when, after a 4-1 start, Prescott said the Cowboys were “Tony’s team” in reference to Tony Romo. Romo, though, never got his job back as Prescott went 13-3.
The Cowboys now belong to Prescott, with Romo having retired.
“I tell him all the time, I say, ‘Man, this is your show. This is your rodeo,’” said Haley, who also was teammates with Hall of Fame quarterbacks Steve Young and Troy Aikman. “I told him that after game [five] when he was saying it was Romo’s show. I wanted to punch him in his chest. Hey, hold up. You’ve won four in a row. Then, you win five a row. Now walk out on the field before the game and say, ‘Who’s team is this?’ If he didn’t say, ‘My team’ real fast, I’ll punch him again. ‘My team.’ He’s got to realize he’s got to control everybody. Whether Romo would have came back or not, it’s about the confidence and believing that he was the man. That he was driving the bus. Then, that confidence will spill over and it did. When you listen to players talk they talk big about Dak, because he’s a man of character and a man of strength and a man of conviction.”
Haley appreciates the journey Prescott has taken from Haughton, La., to the NFL.
“He came from nothing, like me,” Haley said. “So guess what? What can you do? How can you hurt someone that came from nothing, that had to pull himself up from the bootstraps and walk out on the stage wearing that star on his head and go? What can you say? What can you do?”